This is the fourth and final installment in our mini-series on Monday's furlough hearings in Alameda Superior Court, presided by Judge Frank Roesch. Click the following links if you need to catch up:
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
And you can click here to view the most recent Furlough Fights spreadsheet, which details all 23 furlough lawsuits.
The pace of the hearings has quickened. Roesch has told attorneys to avoid retreading ground covered in earlier arguments, and assures them that he'll consider all the points made as he decides each case. Now it's Felix De La Torre's turn to take a swing at Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's furlough policy on behalf of SEIU Local 1000.
Other lawyers have argued that the administration should have analyzed, department-by-department, the impact of furloughs before the governor issued his executive order, in keeping with Government Code 19851. De La Torre raises the legal bar higher:
"The governor not only to has to show it doesn't hurt (departments)," he says. "He has to show it does something for them."
Instead, the policy takes a shortcut. "(Schwarzenegger) wanted the most efficient, easiest route," De La Torre says.
Click the following link to read Roesch's compliment (sort of) to Schwarzenegger.